MO - Yet another KC predator priest is named

MO - Yet another KC predator priest is named

Our hearts ache for the betrayed and wounded Catholics of Kansas City who again are learning about a predator priest through sources other than their bishop. Our hearts ache even more of course, for this victim of Fr. Wgenek and any others he may have hurt.

We commend this brave man for exposing this child molesting cleric and helping to shine light on this continuing abuse and cover up crisis. We hope his decision to seek justice in the courts will be healing for him.

Roughly 30 US bishops have posted names predator priest on their diocesan websites. We have repeatedly asked Finn to take this simple, inexpensive and proven step to helping victims heal. He refuses.

Imagine how much safer kids would be and how much better Catholics would feel if Finn took this practical step towards really making children safer and helping victims heal.

Instead, Finn hires more lawyers, shifts more job titles, tweaks more policies, and pretends that reform is happening. And he concealed and enabled, for months, the crimes of Fr. Shawn Ratigan.

And it's not just Finn. By our count, at least some church employees knew of or suspected Fr. Ratigan's crimes. Few of them did the right thing. Virtually none of them did the right thing promptly or persistently. Virtually all of them are still on Finn's payroll. And we're somehow expected to believe things in the KC church hierarchy are changing?

Jennifer Valenti (one of Finn's new lawyers) should be particularly ashamed. She's a former prosecutor. She should be leading the charge for openness. She should be insisting that the names of the 23 proven, admitted and credibly accused KC pedophile priests are widely circulated throughout the diocese and the community.

Instead, she plays Finn's PR game, disclosing numbers of allegations but not names of wrongdoers. How does a parent protect his or her child from a number?